


Things and stuff

by Donya



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Archive of Our Own AU, Gen, Not Politically Correct, mentioned sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-25
Updated: 2016-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-28 14:13:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6332329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Donya/pseuds/Donya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Archive of Our Own au in which Loki is a fanfiction writer and Tony and Steve are his readers.</p><p>Or, the ups and downs of being a part of this God-forsaken site.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things and stuff

The day started as usual. A noisy neighbour awoke Loki before sunrise, too early to get up and too late to catch some more sleep. So Loki did what always helped him pass the time- started to think about his fanfic ideas. It was so easy to mentally plan the whole thing, all the plot twists and dialogues. The only problem was to sit down and write it.

By the time Loki got up, he had dozens of ideas for new stories. Full of energy and determination, he quickly brew some coffee and opened his laptop. First checked his stats on the Archive, hoping for some encouragement. Someone new subscribed to him, the biggest joy for a humble fanfiction writer. He had waited so long for the number of author subscription to reach three digits and when it finally happened, it did feel great. Still smiling, Loki opened Zen Writer, the perfect program for easily distracted writers. A quick look at the documents, all the drafts he had started and didn't have the patience to finish. Smut, angst, fics about babies and family, tooth-rotting fluff, stories too complicated to put into words and so long that the final editing would take a fortnight. Which one to choose and try to finish?

After a long deliberation, Loki picked one of his baby fics. The offspring of his otp was two-three years old. Describing the toddler's behaviour used to be a problem, as Loki did not know any children well enough, but there was a clever solution. Exhibitionist parents who document their and their children's lives on Youtube have helped Loki so much in that matter. One ten-minute long video could give enough information to write a 5000-word story, detailed. At least one good side of oversharing and giving up one's privacy. The bonus was a good laugh every time such an overly open Youtuber would complain once again that the viewers dare to criticise them for things like having six kids with three men by the age of 21 or not vaccinating their litter of kids. Oh, if only there was a way to keep things private and avoid all the drama. Watching videos of three-year-olds running around wearing a diaper and being breastfed, Loki appreciated his mother even more. Whatever happened at their home was a family matter and all the embarrassing things Loki did as a child at home went unnoticed by strangers.

Before Loki focused on the enormous effort to write a single sentence that makes sense, he took a look at his inbox, waiting for the kudos e-mail from the Archive. Things were good as long as he received it every day. Someone liked a fic that Loki didn't even remember. He clicked on the link, anxious as always when he was to read his old stuff. Most of the times it was a torture. After three paragraphs and countless groans, Loki noticed a spelling error that completely changed the meaning of the sentence. The worst thing imaginable, old story that he had edited thoroughly was freaking flawed and none of the readers said anything. Most likely, they didn't notice or thought it would be rude to correct Loki. Cursing himself and the useless Grammarly for not doing its job properly, Loki edited that single mistake at the speed of light. Did someone see the misspelt word and think that Loki had only started learning English? For sure someone did. What a shame! Still, not as bad as Loki's most unfortunate typo possible- 'Slipnot'. Grammar nazis were over the moon to see it and did not believe it was a typo.

To calm his nerves, Loki returned to Zen Writer. Oddly enough, he managed to write a whole paragraph without too much suffering. He read it carefully, thinking if he used his favourite words too often again. _Unbearable, almost, learn, pleasure, leant._ Too bad he never had an opportunity to use his word number one, larynx, in his fics. Mmm, larynx. Beautiful.

Another cup of coffee and Loki began the tedious work of the first editing. Having learnt that he didn't really know English, he meticulously googled a couple of phrases he had just used. Despite being 99 % sure that he knew their true meaning, Loki checked them, one by one. Every foreign language is a minefield when you try to write in it and it's best not to have too much faith in your abilities. On the other hand, some phrases look so good that Loki leaves them intact, even if they are not totally correct. 

After all that hard work, Loki checked his inbox once more. No comments on any of his fics. Probably because he had not updated anything for quite a while. Still no sign of life from Tony. Loki sighed and closed the laptop. He had to go back to the real life.

 

On his way to work, Loki allowed himself to think about Tony again. That was probably the weirdest relationship of his life. They met on the Archive when Loki was still new to the world of shipping, otps and fanfiction. Tony was one of the first readers that actually encouraged Loki to write. Different than Loki's writing teacher that claimed Loki was completely unable to write a good introduction or a satisfying ending. The only comfort was that Loki knew the writing teacher of his writing teacher and learnt that the latter was a lazy, mediocre student. Anyway, Tony would read whatever Loki had written and never failed to leave a nice comment, longer than one sentence. Loki always replied and Tony replied as well. They started to exchange messages as comments under one of Loki's fics and in a result, a humble, short fic was blessed with hundreds of comments. Loki was delighted, he finally could share his headcanons with someone that knew what he meant. Nobody from the real life would understand why Loki devoted so much time to watching tv shows and writing about two fictional characters that did not even like each other. He liked to imagine being completely honest about it and telling his father that all he wants for Christmas is his otp to become canon or to get three hundred kudos on a single fic.

Loki would tell Tony about the ups and downs of being a fanfiction writer on the Archive. The frustration of finding _can';t_ or _o_ instead of _to_ mistakes that grammar check does not bring to his attention, instead stubbornly 'correcting' words and phrases that are already correct. The awkward feeling when a gift fic is ignored by the recipient. The Chinese and Russian readers asking for permission to translate fics int their languages. The disbelief when someone more talented praises your work. People getting mad when the writer comes up wth an awesome plot twist and call him juvenile. The heartache of watching your perfect fic that took weeks to write and edit go unnoticed, or the other way round, receiving tons of kudos on a stupid fic that is too popular to delete it. The discouragement of having to compete with much better writers. The lack of strength to finish multi-chapter stories. The Archive's lazy and useless staff members who can't be bothered when one member harasses another, even checking if the bully is a registered member or not is too much of an effort for them. The 'Brevity is the soul of wit, but we need your comment to have text in it' text. The weird feeling when you accidentally read something so perverted that you want to call the police and beg God for forgiveness. American betas who 'correct' every British English spelling and punctuation in a 12700-word long fic, even Present Perfect, using a black font instead of some brighter and easier to spot colour. Readers that don't know what fiction is, making Loki give up on mankind. Plenty of complaints every time he wrote a very kinky smut because obviously fics on the Archive are official guidelines for safe sex. Accusations of child abuse of a fictional character because he was affectionately called silly and chunky. Wondering how Loki, raised as a Christian, could possibly write about ass licking. Those people probably also believe that photoshopped picture of a celebrity causes anorexia and listening to metal equals worshipping satan.

They would talk about sexual kinks they only heard of thanks to fanfiction, including daddy kink. Both Tony and Loki found it revolting. Loki knew one couple, age difference around twenty-five years and could not comprehend why anyone would find older men attractive. That particular man was as old as his partner's father and reminded Loki of Odin. Why, why would one want to date their own father? An old guy that listens to the news on the radio, eats raw onions and garlic because it's so healthy, takes two hundred pills a day for all the illnesses that he has and doesn't know how to use a computer. However, that didn't stop Loki from writing a daddy kink fic that was surprisingly successful. Also, Loki admitted how paranoid he felt every time he wrote a fic coincidentally similar to another one, posted by some other writer around the same time. No one accused him of plagiarism but maybe someone thought about it. And is it wrong to plagiarise your own works? By using the same idea for two different otps? Tony said it's fine but he just wanted more fics, regardless of how creative they were. 

They also discuss the hardships of being a shipper.  Fanfiction writers not taking into consideration your very specific demands, thus forcing you to start writing yourself. Tv shows cancelled, otps separated because a greedy actress didn't get a raise or a producer kicked out a great actor because of political correctness. The unbearably long waiting for a new season. Season finales written by satan. And Tumblr, of course, a site you join for fanart and meta but end up being flooded by posts about political correctness and social justice. The realisation that Tumblr is only for morbidly obese, black or biracial, pagan or atheist feminists on a fad diet that somehow doesn't help with caricaturally huge bottoms, obsessed with taking nude selfies anti-vaxxers, very confused about their sexuality and gender non-Caucasian racists who boycott capital letters and punctuation, beg you for your money, post pictures of asses with stretch marks, spoil every movie, tv show and book, and brag about what they stole from shops. Everyone else will be made feel unwelcome by those who demand tolerance but only for minority groups. 

 

Soon they had so much to tell that they would run out of space as a comment on AO3 can contain only 4300 characters. The usual reply had to be divided into two parts. Loki tried hard not to pry into Tony's personal life or talk only about himself. They often exchanged ideas for fics, although Tony confessed he was too lazy to write anything. Once Loki mentioned another person that could be described as his fan and that was Steve. To his shock, Tony knew Steve and apparently they were friends.

Steve was one of the strangest shippers on the Archive. He only liked smutty fics, preferably extra wild. He wanted everything, asphyxiation, possessiveness, non-consent and was aggressively supportive of every morally questionable idea that Loki had as a writer. He would give Loki prompts, mostly dark and troubling. Loki suspected that Steve lived in a very conservative community and his repressed sexuality led him to the Archive. Tony confirmed that assumption by revealing that Steve used to be an Amish.

It was stupid but Loki felt jealous. Tony and Steve lived in one country, had been friends for some time, while Loki was all alone in Europe. It got worse when at the end of August Tony said the next day was Steve's birthday. Loki wrote a smutty story as a birthday gift, on the spot. Fifteen days later, Steve returned the favour and informed Loki that Tony's birthday was hours away. Loki felt obliged to produce another gift fic that included everything that Tony liked. Too bad neither of them asked about Loki's date of birth and it was right between Steve's and Tony's.

Loki reminded himself not to have high expectations or any expectations. Tony lived too far away and never suggested exchanging e-mail address or phone numbers. The point was that Loki, despite his young age, had always been betrayed by his friends. Every single one of them, sooner of later, abandoned Loki or used him. He rarely thought about it because the pain was still fresh. Only later did he realise that it doesn't matter how hard you try to be the good friend or to maintain a friendship. People seek the company of others only if they can gain something from it, and it has been like that from the dawn of time. Cavemen had higher chances of surviving another day when they were a part of a group. People are naturally selfish and self-centred, hence the disbelief when we meet someone with a high level of interpersonal intelligence, a selfless charity worker or an anonymous philanthropist. Helping others without documenting it on Facebook? Unbelievable these days. For most people all that matters is themselves and that makes true friendship rare, if not impossible. Having had a really bad experience in that matter, Loki was very cautious about his relation with Tony. Yet after a couple of months, Tony was still there, still talking to Loki. Was it the time to stop being so bitter and pessimistic? But what if Tony liked Steve more?

First, Steve stopped reading Loki's fics, even those written specifically for him. Then Tony needed more and more time to reply to Loki's messages until he stopped doing that altogether. Loki waited patiently, one month, another, thinking that Tony was either busy or tired or wanted to write a proper reply, not some quick one line, or he died. Loki checked if it was really Tony's turn to reply and it was. During that time, a tv show that they both loved was tragically cancelled and even that didn't help. Like a creep, Loki found Tony's account on Deviantart and Tumblr. Tony was alive, active and chatting with Steve.

 

On his way from work, Loki thought about a very explicit fic that he had planned for months. As soon as he got home, he checked the draft. Two first paragraphs, both useless. Maybe it was a sign to start one of those fics that he had always wanted to write but the necessary research would take months? Like the one about his otp trying to be the first people to reach the summit of K2 in winter. While in the death zone, Person A does something reckless and Person B has to decide whether to leave A or risk his own life. Or, Person A wakes up and everything seems odd, his reflection in the mirror shows an old man and there's a stranger in his house that claims to be A's husband. Person B explains to A that he's suffering from Alzheimer's. A doesn't believe and violently attack's B, who's used to that and doesn't fight back, just cries silently. None of the glamourised 'old couple falling in love again every day' kind of crap, that's definitely not what Alzheimer's does to people. Or the one about a tumour. Fine. Loki opened the browser and began the research. He had read dozens of scientific articles and accidentally watched a very vivid video of a tumour removal. He made notes, proud of himself. Now, wait a year to actually use the notes. Great. So, the smut again?

Looking for an inspiration, Loki opened an incognito tab to watch some porn, a perfect source of information. He watched people doing the do, thinking if the particular position is hard to describe or not, or if it hurts. It's always easier to write from experience, so apart from trying the food that his otp liked or making faces to best describe reactions and emotions, Loki often did other things to make his writing seem more realistic. Does one finger in the ass can make a person cum? Does wearing a butt plug hurt? Is spanking painful? You don't know unless you try it. However, there's always a danger of coming across really weird stuff, like accidentally finding a really long post about people addicted to sticking fingers up their butts to defecate faster. Particularly popular among busy parents. Just when Loki thought that nothing can surprise him anymore. 

 

Some time after the disappearance of Tony and Steve, Loki met someone new. Finally, a person that would point out the mistakes in Loki's writing, like the super embarrassing _new_ instead of _knew_. But it was too late, not for the correction, but for Loki. He could not trust another person anymore. He was not destined to have friends. Solitude was safer, more predictable and less stressful.


End file.
